Murder most incorrect…and complicated

We’ve written about the assassination of Hamas terrorist Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in posts including “Murder most incorrect” and “Murder more or less incorrect.” The Dubai authorities have vehemently fingered Israel’s Mossad as the perpetrator of the assassination operation since they first disclosed it. The only arrests made so far, however, have been of two Palestinian Arabs.
An additional complication came to light this week. If the assassination was a Mossad operation, would members of the assassination team have hightailed it to…Iran? In a brief article, the New York Times reported that the Dubai police released the names of 15 more suspects on Wednesday. For those keeping track, that brings the number of assassination team suspects to 26.
The Times reserved this “striking detail” for the sixth paragraph of its article: two of the new suspects, identified as Nicole Sandra McCabe and Adam Marcus Korman and carrying Australian passports, left Dubai on a ship bound for Iran. “The statement included no further information about the two suspects or why they would have gone to Iran.” The Times does not seek to assess the implication of this fact for the imputation of the operation to the Mossad.
Among those who have attempted to think through the implication of the latest identification of suspects by the Dubai authorities are David Pryce-Jones and Caroline Glick. We await word from Roger L. Simon, whose latest post on the assassination is here.
JOHN adds: Reuters brings its eagle eye to this fascinating story and finds its essence in the brand new concept of a “passport ordeal”: “Britain to investigate passport ordeal in Israel.”
UPDATE: Robert Baer has an illuminating essay on the Dubai operation in today’s Wall Street Journal. Baer summarizes most of the known facts and comments on the tradecraft involved in the operation. Baer compares the Dubai operation with an apparent 1992 Mossad operation in Paris.
FINALLY: Roger L. Simon checks in, and he was worth waiting for.